The silver blade of a dinner knife scraped against porcelain, clean, clinical. Like a scalpel finding flesh.
Of all the ways Solan Elric had imagined sharing a meal with Clara, this ranked dead last. Not because she’d invited him. But because they were seated across from her brother. In the main dining hall of the administrative sector , of all places. Solan didn’t even know students are allowed here. A room so immaculate it could double as a tribunal chamber.
Everything on the table radiated precision. Even the tablecloth had military posture—pressed linen with creases like command lines. The steak was dissected into geometrical perfection. The sparkling water fizzed in place, like the carbonation had been ordered to stand at attention.
Solan stared at the tremble in his knife and suddenly missed the cafeteria’s plastic forks with a desperate ache.
“Solan Elric?” Damien Vale’s voice struck like a verdict. “First year?”
“Yes.” It came out light. Feather-soft. A verdict already accepted.
“I’m senior” Metal against ceramic—
Another slice. Measured. Damien Vale moved with the precision of a surgeon.
“My sister doesn’t usually bring boys to dinner.”
Clara’s ears turned cherry red. Solan nearly choked. “She—this… this is literally our first dinner! I mean, yeah, we have Disaster Response Theory together, but that’s—strictly academic!” And just like that, he wanted to chew off his own tongue. He sounded like he was pleading the Fifth.
“Do I need to cover your meal?” Damien’s eyes flicked to Solan’s plate—where the mushrooms lay butchered beyond recognition. One tragic splash of sauce stained the napkin like something from a crime scene. Before Solan could answer, Clara spoke.
“He’s usually not that nervous.” Her voice was calm, but her fingers tapped lightly against her glass. “During the drill, he threw himself at the gun man.”
Solan’s fork stopped mid-air. She remembered? She actually remembered?
Damien’s knife froze mid-slice. “Kamuy stability?”
“Uh—generally stable!” Solan sat bolt upright. “Summoning-type, weapon manifestation. Limited to bladed weapon. Strictly no usage at night!” It sounded like he was being interrogated.
Clara lowered her gaze, biting back a smile. Her shoulders shook just slightly. The sun caught in her water glass, scattering light across her face. Her lashes threw shadows over her cheeks—quiet, flickering, delicate.
Damien nodded once. No further questions. Then: “Have you ever dueled someone?”
Solan answered too fast. “No.” A beat. Heat crawled up his neck. “I mean—no, not yet.” He tried to reclaim the word, reshape it into something less pathetic. “I’m not… avoiding it. I’m just waiting for the right match.” It wasn’t exactly a no. But close enough.
Damien didn’t smile, but his expression shifted—fractionally. Thoughtful. “I know the Scratchlist isn’t mandatory. But it’s a tradition. Students sometimes start a duel not to win. Just to learn where they stand.” He didn’t press the point. Just let it hang there, offered without weight or pressure.
Then he looked at Solan more directly. His voice didn’t change, but something in his eyes steadied. “You don’t have to prove anything to anyone. Just don’t pretend you don’t belong.” Then, unexpected. “He’s honest,” Damien said, as if filing a report.
“Mm.” Clara looked across the table—directly at Solan. Her lips curved into something unreadable. Almost fond. “And sometimes... kind of funny.”
Clatter. Solan’s dinner knife hit the plate. His ears rang like someone had lobbed a flashbang into the dining room. Did she—did she just call him funny? In front of her brother? That brother?
He returned to chewing his now-cold steak, numbly. And in that moment, he finally understood the Effigies on display downstairs—that terrible, exquisite helplessness of being pinned in place. Of being on display, while everyone else discussed what to do with you.
The dorm room door clicked softly open.
Solan Elric slipped in like a fugitive—each breath turned down to a whisper.
“Well, well. The survivor returns,” Matt didn’t look up fully—just half-lifted one eye from his phone. “Is the corpse still in one piece?”
Solan said nothing. Didn’t even take off his shoes. He collapsed face-first onto the bed, like the mattress might absorb everything he didn’t want to feel. Flat on his back, limbs loose as string, he looked like a specimen drained of bone.
“That face…” Matt tugged one earbud free. “They put truth serum in your wine or something?”
The blanket whipped up, then dropped—
Solan wrapped himself tight, sealing all edges like a man preparing for re-entry.
He wasn’t tired. He was wide awake. Terrifyingly awake. His brain felt like someone had taken fine-grade sandpaper to it—raw and hyper-aware, every nerve ending lit up and twitching.
“He’s kind of funny.” The sentence ricocheted through his skull like a stray firework—lodged deep in the folds of his cortex, fizzing endlessly.
It wasn’t the first time someone had called him funny . His elementary science teacher said his silk moth experiment was funny—which was a polite way of describing bug-based chaos in a shoebox. Matt called him funny too, usually between “you’re a menace” and “how did you turn mac and cheese into pavement?”
But when Clara Vale said it...
Her lashes had caught the dining room light like fine thread. Her smile had curved like she’d spotted an oddly-shaped cloud. Her voice—barely a breath—had landed on the table like snowfall on porcelain.
Solan flipped onto his side. Then back. Then curled into himself like a sea creature sensing danger. What was “funny,” really? Was it politeness? Like complimenting a painting in a dentist’s office? Was it amusement? Like watching a panda fall off a slide?
Or—just maybe—was there the tiniest, stupidest, statistically irrelevant chance that—
“Nope.”
The word came out muffled through the blanket. He knew himself too well. The drill? He tripped and body-slammed. Class? He was a frequent flyer in nap-land. Presence on campus? He could disappear for a week and no one would notice. And today? He launched mushroom fragments in front of Damien Vale.
“If she actually thinks I’m interesting, her standards are buried somewhere near the Earth’s core.”
From the top bunk, Matt snorted. “You just had a three-minute silent monologue with the facial expressions of a tragic soap opera lead.”
Solan yanked the blanket up past his nose. Outside, wind rattled the branches. Shadows clawed softly at the wall. He shut his eyes. But the word echoed louder in the dark: funny . Not a crush. Not infatuation.
Just…
A moment. Like walking past an exhibit. Pausing. Tilting your head. Saying, “Huh. That color’s kind of nice.” And then moving on.
“Think about something else,” he muttered to the ceiling. “Like the rib structure of the Effigies specimen...” But his brain had other plans. It projected tomorrow like a pre-scheduled breakdown: Would she sit in the same spot? Would her hair brush the edge of his notes? Would she—god forbid—turn and say something again?
“Lost cause,” he whispered into the pillow. “Terminal.”
His phone buzzed under the pillow. A text from Matt, top bunk oracle.
"Need me to book psych services? P.S. You were smiling like a serial killer."